He next assumes what is not granted by the more
rational class of believers, but what perhaps is considered to be true
by some who are devoid of intelligence,—viz., that “God,
like those who are overcome with pity, being Himself overcome,
alleviates the sufferings of the wicked through pity for their
wailings, and casts off the good, who do nothing of that kind, which is
the height of injustice.” Now, in our judgment, God
lightens the suffering of no wicked man who has not betaken himself to
a virtuous life, and casts off no one who is already good, nor yet
alleviates the suffering of any one who mourns, simply because he
utters lamentation, or takes pity upon him, to use the word pity in its
more common acceptation.
36553655ἵνα
κοινότερον
τῷ ἐλέει
χρήσωμαι. But those who
have passed severe condemnation upon themselves because of their sins,
and who, as on that account, lament and bewail themselves as lost, so
far as their previous conduct is concerned, and who have manifested a
satisfactory change, are received by God on account of their
repentance, as those who have undergone a transformation from a life of
great wickedness. For virtue, taking up her abode in the souls of
these persons, and expelling the wickedness which had previous
possession of them, produces an oblivion of the past. And even
although virtue do not effect an entrance, yet if a considerable
progress take place in the soul, even that is sufficient, in the
proportion that it is progressive, to drive out and destroy the flood
of wickedness, so that it almost ceases to remain in the
soul.